LIST OF PANELS

That crises give societies and policy makers new opportunities is slowly becoming a cliché. However, these crises – which we could observe in real time through the COVID-19 pandemic – demonstrate how fragile civilization is; how within a few days political rationales change and transform actors, practices and institutions carrying out political decisions. Among other things, emotionally charged language of crises recalls cultural and historical contexts (see Weible et al, 2020), conflicting values spark public controversies (Alexander 2019) and crises call for engagement of both citizens and governments. In that respect, these critical moments can also facilitate a dialogue between public policy and social theory which is why our panel takes the context of crises as a chance to foster such a dialog and to propose new insight to advance policy research.
The broad fields of social theory cover concepts such as risk (Adam et al., 2000; Beck, 1992; Douglas, 1992; Luhmann, 2017), crisis (Habermas, 1975; Walby, 2015; Alexander 2019), trust (Luhmann, 1979; Gambetta 1988), legitimacy (Boltanski 2011, Blumenberg 1985) or science and expertise (Collins and Evans 2008, Latour 2005, Jasanoff and Simmet 2017). The various ways in which crises produce and transform policy narratives and practices, mobilize or demobilize actors and institutions, and the process throuch which they create specific types of temporalities all call for a deeper integration of social theory in policy studies scholarship.
This panel will thus address potentialities and difficulties of such partnership and discuss lessons which can be drawn from social theory for policy research. We argue that policy analysis of crises might profit from the partnership with social theory. Policy crises in topics such as migration, climate change or health step in new terrains of practices, governance and establish new links between micro and macro structures that can be better understood through the dialog mentioned.
Across both empirical case studies on crisis using social theory as an explanatory lens and theoretical discussion this panel advances an understanding of crises as dynamic sites of meanings and practices that are embedded in values and beliefs in a society. The panel aims to develop a deeper understanding of policy practice in critical moments in diverse policy fields while using social theory. At the same time, the panel wants to use these examples to further conceptualize links between recent social theory and policy analysis both in substantive and methodological ways.
 
References:
 
Adam, B., Beck, U., van Loon, J. (2000). The Risk Society and Beyond: Critical Issues for Social Theory. London: Sage.
Alexander, J. C. (2019). What Makes a Social Crisis?: The Societalization of Social Problems. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Beck, U. (1992). Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage.
Blumenberg, H. (1985). The Legitimacy of the Modern Age (R. M. Wallace, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Boltanski, L. (2011). On critique: A sociology of emancipation. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Collins, H., & Evans, R. (2008). Rethinking expertise. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Douglas, M. (1992). Risk and Blame: Essays in Cultural Theory. London: Routledge.
Gambetta, D. (1988). Trust. Making and breaking cooperative relations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Habermas, J. (1975). Legitimation Crisis. Boston, MA: Beacon Press.
Jasanoff, S., & Simmet, H. R. (2017). No funeral bells: public reason in a ‘post-truth’age. Social Studies of Science, 47(5), 751-770.
Latour, B. (2005). Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Luhmann, N. (2017). Risk: A Sociological Theory. New York: Routledge.
Walby, S. (2015). Crisis. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Weible, C. M. et al. (2020). COVID-19 and the policy sciences: initial reactions and perspectives. Policy sciences, 53, 1-17.

This panel takes the context of crises as a chance to study and to foster a dialog between social theory and policy research as a way to better understand policy processes and policy practices. The panel will address potentialities and difficulties of a conceptual dialog between social theory and policy research and discuss lessons which can be drawn from such a dialog. The panel seeks for an analyses of crises as dynamic sites of meanings and practices embedded in broader values and beliefs. The panel aims to develop a deeper understanding of policy practice in critical moments and to examine interlinks between recent social theory and policy analysis both in substantive and methodological ways.
 
We invite submissions that draw on social theory and/or that address policy crises:
 
·       How can policy research profit from a dialog with social theory?
·       How can social theory be incorporated in theories of policy process?
·       How do crises transform discourses, actors, practices and institutions carrying out political decisions?
·       How do macro structures shape discussions about policy issues such in critical moments? What are the practices of producing by these macro structures?
·       How can social theory concept help us to understand better policy practice in critical moments?
·       What is the relevance of social theory in contemporary policy research?
·       What have we learned from recent crises to advance social theory and policy research?
 
We invite scholars from any discipline to propose papers that use social theory concepts in studying of crises. Both theoretical papers and empirical qualitative and quantitative applications using social theory as an explanatory lens are welcome.